Since last year, Ikemura has made several trips to The Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park in Shiga Prefecture, where she has created a sculpture series titled "Memento Mori." Depicting young girls at repose, the works are coated in a platinum glaze that gives them a bewitching sheen. The forms of the sculptures resemble those of flower buds. But are they in the process of withering or are they about to burst into bloom? The works seems to describe both life and death.

These ceramic sculptures, which were included in Toyota Municipal Museum of Art's summer exhibition, "Carpe Diem: Seize the Day," are not so much about the fleetingness of human life as a heightened awareness of life stemming from a recognition of death. It is as though Ikemura is comparing the white-hot flames of the kiln from which her ceramic works were born with the "flame of life." It is as though these ceramic works, which seem to flicker like flames, suggest at once the impermanence but also the brilliance of life. They also resonate with the three paintings that are included in the exhibition.